New ebay sponsored ads

Well the first trial of the ebay ads in the seller description has hit its first hurdle, The ad which went live on the 22 September, however due to the number of complains that Foxtel received, ebay withdrew the sponsored link from below the place bid button. However being the large Corportation eBay are, then eBay simply back peddalled a little and placed the ad a little further down the page. As explained in ebay's apology , they introduced the new site feature and sponsored link without informing the sellers. Strange that ebay would introduce something first without informing people, unlike the attempt to make paypal mandatory which was done by stealth..

Many Sellers are enraged by this tactic as it takes the Buyer away from the their ebay ad and as such they may not purchase, this is also one of the reasons that you should not have too many external links on your own web page as if you give a person a chance to leave your web page then they most certainly will leave your web page.

One logic would say not to click on the ads so ebay will not get monetary value and to show foxtel that the sponsored links are worthless, the second strategy would be to click on the ads and then read the page as if you are going to purchase the foxtel subscription but after a minute or two hit the back button.

Assuming foxtel are paying on a per click basis, then data (included below) from google keyword tool shows that the CPC for foxtel varies between $3.45 and $7.69, so each day when you are clicking on the ad and reading the page sufficiently long to create the impression this is a true click then this will cost foxtel money.

Should sufficient people do this then, I hope that foxtel and other companies will realise this is a futile effort to advertise and it is not worth the money that they are paying to ebay. Send a message to ebay Australia and Foxtel.. WE DO NOT WANT SPONSORED LINKS ON OUR EBAY ADS....

foxtel $3.45 2,900 3,600
foxtel digital $3.98 73 58
foxtel cable $7.69 22 28
foxtel australia $4.12 170 210
foxtel sports $4.99 28 36
foxtel tv $3.59 210 210
foxtel guide $3.66 140 140
foxtell $4.26 46 58
foxtel satellite $3.92 28 28
foxtel broadband $5.06 12
foxtel sydney $3.85